Brian Chasnoff: Aftershock

A Union Pacific train that jumped the tracks here in October officially injured no one, but sometimes a renegade boxcar can crush a person without even touching him.

One such person is Richard Salinas, a man seemingly plagued by freak accidents.

Years before 17 boxcars jumped the tracks a few feet from his backyard, Salinas suffered a debilitating injury that left him disabled and unemployed. He fell four stories from a scaffolding in 1989, injuring his spine and knees and leaving him to duel with depression.

His life at home with his wife soon fell into a regular rhythm: Wake up, make coffee, go out for a newspaper and settle onto a back porch that faces the tracks. Although his mobility was severely affected, Salinas believed he finally was recovering from the fall.

That changed Oct. 17, when Salinas’ backyard seat afforded him a front-row view of the derailment. He noticed the train seemed to be traveling faster than usual, and the boxcars appeared wobbly, he said. When one of them slammed suddenly into a bedroom two houses down the street, he leaped from his seat and screamed for his family members to run.

According to Salinas, a litany of psychological travails afflicted him afterward: nightmares, loss of appetite, mood swings, a sense of bewilderment. He began to stutter. His marriage was strained, and he moved out of the house.

Yolanda Dominguez, Salinas’ wife, blames everything on the train.

“They don’t realize, it does ruin people’s lives,” she said. “Even though it didn’t hit our house, it did ruin ours.”